As it turns out, this is not the first time the assembled-in-USA question has come up. There are several threads on the topic in the Apple support site dating back to 2006. The consensus seems to be that only units made to order -- say, with an extra-high-capacity hard drive -- get their final assembly in the States.

Not surprising.

Forget about labor costs--if there was a factory built in the US that could rival Foxconn's technology, manpower and output, I think we'd know about it before seeing a 'Made in US' stamp on our devices.

(Robot costs 24000 with an economic life of 10 years, 3 Chinese workers cost 800 with an economic life of 1 year. You do the math)

See THIS is the thing I don't understand. If you take automation to its logical conclusion, you basically remove all non-creative/research/engineering jobs. Who the fark's going to BUY the shiat these robots are making?

Lexx:Because People in power are Stupid: [www.digitivity.com image 234x310]Now replaces 3 chinese workers.

(Robot costs 24000 with an economic life of 10 years, 3 Chinese workers cost 800 with an economic life of 1 year. You do the math)

See THIS is the thing I don't understand. If you take automation to its logical conclusion, you basically remove all non-creative/research/engineering jobs. Who the fark's going to BUY the shiat these robots are making?

Considering the degree of automation we can reach, it seems that the service sector should really pick up a lot of jobs since people are going to be focused on recreation. The problem is service sector wages aren't matching the service sector market demands.

Yes I realise this would mean paying fry cooks and burger flippers more money, but they're doing the work that society has decided is needed in bulk.

Lexx:Because People in power are Stupid: [www.digitivity.com image 234x310]Now replaces 3 chinese workers.

(Robot costs 24000 with an economic life of 10 years, 3 Chinese workers cost 800 with an economic life of 1 year. You do the math)

See THIS is the thing I don't understand. If you take automation to its logical conclusion, you basically remove all non-creative/research/engineering jobs. Who the fark's going to BUY the shiat these robots are making?

Those robots will also need service technicians. A technician doesn't need to have any idea what an integrated circuit does or how the robots are programmed as long as he can replace a bearing or resolder a chip without frying it with an ESD.

Lexx:Because People in power are Stupid: [www.digitivity.com image 234x310]Now replaces 3 chinese workers.

(Robot costs 24000 with an economic life of 10 years, 3 Chinese workers cost 800 with an economic life of 1 year. You do the math)

See THIS is the thing I don't understand. If you take automation to its logical conclusion, you basically remove all non-creative/research/engineering jobs. Who the fark's going to BUY the shiat these robots are making?

Lexx:Because People in power are Stupid: [www.digitivity.com image 234x310]Now replaces 3 chinese workers.

(Robot costs 24000 with an economic life of 10 years, 3 Chinese workers cost 800 with an economic life of 1 year. You do the math)

See THIS is the thing I don't understand. If you take automation to its logical conclusion, you basically remove all non-creative/research/engineering jobs. Who the fark's going to BUY the shiat these robots are making?

Lexx:Because People in power are Stupid: [www.digitivity.com image 234x310]Now replaces 3 chinese workers.

(Robot costs 24000 with an economic life of 10 years, 3 Chinese workers cost 800 with an economic life of 1 year. You do the math)

See THIS is the thing I don't understand. If you take automation to its logical conclusion, you basically remove all non-creative/research/engineering jobs. Who the fark's going to BUY the shiat these robots are making?

I just hate this whole line of thinking. We seem to think we need to keep everybody busy with jobs and such. Nobody ever says, "Wow, now that robots are doing all the jobs, we can be free and spend more time with our families!"

Lexx:Because People in power are Stupid: [www.digitivity.com image 234x310]Now replaces 3 chinese workers.

(Robot costs 24000 with an economic life of 10 years, 3 Chinese workers cost 800 with an economic life of 1 year. You do the math)

See THIS is the thing I don't understand. If you take automation to its logical conclusion, you basically remove all non-creative/research/engineering jobs. Who the fark's going to BUY the shiat these robots are making?

Lexx:Because People in power are Stupid: [www.digitivity.com image 234x310]Now replaces 3 chinese workers.

(Robot costs 24000 with an economic life of 10 years, 3 Chinese workers cost 800 with an economic life of 1 year. You do the math)

See THIS is the thing I don't understand. If you take automation to its logical conclusion, you basically remove all non-creative/research/engineering jobs. Who the fark's going to BUY the shiat these robots are making?

The assembly factory may be completely automated for a specific product. Retooling that factory every new product cycle requires vast armies of vendors and manual labor. Someone has to make the molds, the stamps, the press tooling, reprogram the robot way-points, etc.

Automation typically doesn't remove jobs already in place. It's usually only implemented to increase production (same work force, 2x-3x the output). The costs involved in automating an already existing assembly line is usually prohibitive. The cost of automating a new assembly line is far less intrusive.

Also, by moving the manual labor farther away from the final end product, quality control is a lot easier to achieve. It's easier to inspect and maintain the tooling on a die press than it is to inspect every one of the millions of parts that die press is going to make.

Lexx:Because People in power are Stupid: [www.digitivity.com image 234x310]Now replaces 3 chinese workers.

(Robot costs 24000 with an economic life of 10 years, 3 Chinese workers cost 800 with an economic life of 1 year. You do the math)

See THIS is the thing I don't understand. If you take automation to its logical conclusion, you basically remove all non-creative/research/engineering jobs. Who the fark's going to BUY the shiat these robots are making?

1) The guys who design the stuff, and program the bots. (Since we're not quite at the point where computers can program themselves.) Based on my job hunt (CS), 60K in Detroit, 50K in Chicago, 80K in SF, and 90K in the Pacific Northwest is not unheard of straight out of college, going up 50-100% after 5 years of experience. (Plus stock, 401K matching, benefits, etc.)

2) The service sector. Especially in a generation when the ex-blue collar workers are dead, and not flooding the market with un/under-qualified applicants. A lot of this service sector stuff can't be automated and will require people who will demand pay. The pay won't be great, but lots of people * some money/person = quite a bit of money.

3) The "can't automate that" unions. 80K a year plus a pension for driving a beer truck in the midwest is a lot of money, and that's what they're making now.

4) The guys who make a ton of money by owning the companies.

If you want to raise standard of living, Step 1 is to raise productivity/worker. Automation raises productivity/worker. Thus Automation is potentially good for the economy and the average standard of living.

/Admittedly, then Step 2 is: Figure out how to move the money back into worker's hands, and out of the big corporate giants, which we STILL haven't figured out.

Lexx:See THIS is the thing I don't understand. If you take automation to its logical conclusion, you basically remove all non-creative/research/engineering jobs. Who the fark's going to BUY the shiat these robots are making?

The US is still a manufacturing powerhouse because we are really good at automating the shiat out of the manufacturing process. The stuff we can't automate we send to China.

meyerkev:/Admittedly, then Step 2 is: Figure out how to move the money back into worker's hands, and out of the big corporate giants, which we STILL haven't figured out.

As much as I hate to admit it, 70% tax brackets for the highest earners do that. Say you set the 2nd highest bracket at 40% marginal rate with a $500,000 cap and 70% marginal rate for everything above $500,000, you would see a dramatic decrease in the number of people making more than $500,000 per year. It is no fun to make $2 million per year when you have to write a check to the Feds for $1.475 million (70% of $1.5 million + 40% of $500k).

Lumpmoose:As it turns out, this is not the first time the assembled-in-USA question has come up. There are several threads on the topic in the Apple support site dating back to 2006. The consensus seems to be that only units made to order -- say, with an extra-high-capacity hard drive -- get their final assembly in the States.

Not surprising.

Forget about labor costs--if there was a factory built in the US that could rival Foxconn's technology, manpower and output, I think we'd know about it before seeing a 'Made in US' stamp on our devices.

That's icing on the cake. The reason why Foxconn wins is that it can dump whatever waste it wants into the local water supply and the government does nothing. Hazardous waste disposal is a huge cost to companies in the developed world doing this sort of thing.

Note that I'm not arguing that we should reduce regulation of hazardous materials in the developed world. I'm saying China is raping its environment and it's going to come back to haunt them.

weiserfireman:It is no fun to make $2 million per year when you have to write a check to the Feds for $1.475 million (70% of $1.5 million + 40% of $500k).

And the problem with that is that you've just made any investment require a 4:1 return to break even. Right now, we're at 35%, which is a 1.54:1 return. It's not so much that people won't invest, it's that a lot of their investments go from big wins to horrific losses under that level of taxation.

For whatever reason, we've had a fly infestation in the common area of my apartment building. Over the course of three days, hundreds of flies have died. I can't help but wonder if any of them were Steve Jobs.

meyerkev:Lexx: Because People in power are Stupid: [www.digitivity.com image 234x310]Now replaces 3 chinese workers.

(Robot costs 24000 with an economic life of 10 years, 3 Chinese workers cost 800 with an economic life of 1 year. You do the math)

See THIS is the thing I don't understand. If you take automation to its logical conclusion, you basically remove all non-creative/research/engineering jobs. Who the fark's going to BUY the shiat these robots are making?

1) The guys who design the stuff, and program the bots. (Since we're not quite at the point where computers can program themselves.) Based on my job hunt (CS), 60K in Detroit, 50K in Chicago, 80K in SF, and 90K in the Pacific Northwest is not unheard of straight out of college, going up 50-100% after 5 years of experience. (Plus stock, 401K matching, benefits, etc.)

2) The service sector. Especially in a generation when the ex-blue collar workers are dead, and not flooding the market with un/under-qualified applicants. A lot of this service sector stuff can't be automated and will require people who will demand pay. The pay won't be great, but lots of people * some money/person = quite a bit of money.

3) The "can't automate that" unions. 80K a year plus a pension for driving a beer truck in the midwest is a lot of money, and that's what they're making now.

4) The guys who make a ton of money by owning the companies.

If you want to raise standard of living, Step 1 is to raise productivity/worker. Automation raises productivity/worker. Thus Automation is potentially good for the economy and the average standard of living.

/Admittedly, then Step 2 is: Figure out how to move the money back into worker's hands, and out of the big corporate giants, which we STILL haven't figured out.

You're repeating my own argument instead of responding to it. #1 is the creative industry / engineering type. #2 is the service sector, aka Walmart employees. #3 is unions that are quickly fading away as their collective bargaining rights are under attack #4 are the problem.

I'm starting to despair here - it's sounding increasingly like the social contract is dead, and unless you're either a business owner or inventor/engineer, you're doomed to be a service worker, working for subsistence wages, selling items & services that you, yourself, will never be able to afford.

Lexx:Because People in power are Stupid: [www.digitivity.com image 234x310]Now replaces 3 chinese workers.

(Robot costs 24000 with an economic life of 10 years, 3 Chinese workers cost 800 with an economic life of 1 year. You do the math)

See THIS is the thing I don't understand. If you take automation to its logical conclusion, you basically remove all non-creative/research/engineering jobs. Who the fark's going to BUY the shiat these robots are making?

Flab:Lexx: Because People in power are Stupid: [www.digitivity.com image 234x310]Now replaces 3 chinese workers.

(Robot costs 24000 with an economic life of 10 years, 3 Chinese workers cost 800 with an economic life of 1 year. You do the math)

See THIS is the thing I don't understand. If you take automation to its logical conclusion, you basically remove all non-creative/research/engineering jobs. Who the fark's going to BUY the shiat these robots are making?

Lexx:meyerkev: Lexx: Because People in power are Stupid: [www.digitivity.com image 234x310]Now replaces 3 chinese workers.

(Robot costs 24000 with an economic life of 10 years, 3 Chinese workers cost 800 with an economic life of 1 year. You do the math)

See THIS is the thing I don't understand. If you take automation to its logical conclusion, you basically remove all non-creative/research/engineering jobs. Who the fark's going to BUY the shiat these robots are making?

1) The guys who design the stuff, and program the bots. (Since we're not quite at the point where computers can program themselves.) Based on my job hunt (CS), 60K in Detroit, 50K in Chicago, 80K in SF, and 90K in the Pacific Northwest is not unheard of straight out of college, going up 50-100% after 5 years of experience. (Plus stock, 401K matching, benefits, etc.)

2) The service sector. Especially in a generation when the ex-blue collar workers are dead, and not flooding the market with un/under-qualified applicants. A lot of this service sector stuff can't be automated and will require people who will demand pay. The pay won't be great, but lots of people * some money/person = quite a bit of money.

3) The "can't automate that" unions. 80K a year plus a pension for driving a beer truck in the midwest is a lot of money, and that's what they're making now.

4) The guys who make a ton of money by owning the companies.

If you want to raise standard of living, Step 1 is to raise productivity/worker. Automation raises productivity/worker. Thus Automation is potentially good for the economy and the average standard of living.

/Admittedly, then Step 2 is: Figure out how to move the money back into worker's hands, and out of the big corporate giants, which we STILL haven't figured out.

You're repeating my own argument instead of responding to it. #1 is the creative industry / engineering type. #2 is the service sector, aka Walmart employees. #3 is unions that are quickly fading away as thei ...

Until the manufacturing industry wages in the developping world rise to match those of the Western Hemisphere, or that shipping costs become prohibitive, That's the only solution.

weiserfireman:meyerkev: /Admittedly, then Step 2 is: Figure out how to move the money back into worker's hands, and out of the big corporate giants, which we STILL haven't figured out.

As much as I hate to admit it, 70% tax brackets for the highest earners do that. Say you set the 2nd highest bracket at 40% marginal rate with a $500,000 cap and 70% marginal rate for everything above $500,000, you would see a dramatic decrease in the number of people making more than $500,000 per year. It is no fun to make $2 million per year when you have to write a check to the Feds for $1.475 million (70% of $1.5 million + 40% of $500k).

70% marginal isn't required. What *is* required:

-taxing income equally. Capital gains, I'm looking at you.-discouraging rent-seeking (ie, contributes nothing to the economy) behavior / business practices-defunding the military-industrial complex by at least 20%, putting some of that against the deficit/debt, and aiming the rest at public infrastructure projects where all that mechanical engineering talent can be effectively put to work. Think renewable energy & high-efficiency mass transit-going single payer health care & cutting out the insurance industry. They add NOTHING to the economy.-for that matter, massively increasing the # of med school positions. Doctors shouldn't be making half a million, plus, per year-end the war on drugs, release all the petty criminals, and with the money saved, fund research of opiate vaccines & rehab programs

meyerkev:1) The guys who design the stuff, and program the bots. (Since we're not quite at the point where computers can program themselves.) Based on my job hunt (CS), 60K in Detroit, 50K in Chicago, 80K in SF, and 90K in the Pacific Northwest is not unheard of straight out of college, going up 50-100% after 5 years of experience. (Plus stock, 401K matching, benefits, etc.)

As another CS who previously made cell phone interfaces for much less (until that was outsourced and my department laid off), this, if not bullshiat, is such a miniscule market that it has no bearing whatsoever on CS wages. In my job search earlier this year, I saw companies asking for CS majors for the opulent price of minimum wage.The kind that get that kind of money out of college are well-connected or got one of the few good internships. The rest are relegated to substandard wages for overblown qualifications.